3 Coaching Value Drivers of Data Visualization

One thing front line managers today are not short on is data. Each day brings a new stream of spreadsheets, reports, tables, analyses, and other data sources designed to help managers make better decisions and run their business. The reality is that all of this data is not necessarily having the desired effect. In fact in a lot of cases, it’s creating the opposite outcome—overloading managers with data to the point it’s taking time away from their top priority of developing their people.

Case in point: During the Vietnam war, a trend emerged in which fighter pilots were being shot down at an increasing rate during dog fights. After analyzing cockpit data, researchers found that a group of pilots who shut off their alarm systems after only 2 or 3 alarms went off so they could focus on the task at hand had better survival rates than their counterparts who left all alarms on. What this suggested was that after a certain point, too much data and warning systems can have a counterproductive effect. This showed that it’s vital to prioritize the most important, urgent information and manage the information flow in order to help pilots focus on their primary task—flying the plane and fighting the enemy.

As this relates to managers and coaching, there are 3 key value areas where data visualization can have a dramatic impact on sales performance, employee satisfaction and retention, and professional development of sales team members.

1. Visualized data is easier to digest. Just like food, data that’s hard to digest can give you heartburn, or leave you feeling queasy and unsure of what to do about it. When managers are given the right data in ways that are meaningful to the task at hand (eg, for coaching) it helps them focus on decision making and prioritization instead of slicing, dicing, and dissecting a lot of disparate data points. Visualized data in coaching applications should be designed to help managers focus on specific tasks that guide and enable better coaching. 
2. Priorities and warning signs present themselves faster. One of the big challenges many managers have with the current flow of data is that it’s just data. It’s usually not organized in a way that’s designed to help prioritize important and urgent needs or opportunities. In contrast, visualized data presents “insights” in a way that’s designed to draw attention to issues, opportunities, and trends that help managers see these things earlier. Quicker visibility typically gives them more time to react, plan, and take the right action, which results in better sales outcomes and efficiencies. 
3. Collaboration is easier with visualized data. The concept of collaborative coaching relies heavily on the manager and the sales professional participating in and taking ownership for outcomes from coaching. This collaboration can be significantly more challenging when using data from multiple disparate sources, having to interpret it in order to gain consensus, and then factoring in variability of the type and source of each data point. Much of this process is worked out in the design of the data visualization elements of an application. This process takes a lot of the guesswork and debate out of the equation and places the focus on performance, development, and results of the sales professional.

If you’re considering adopting a coaching platform or application, we recommend looking beyond the basic support functions and looking closely at how the solution uses data visualization to tell the story. You should be able to instantly gain insights and draw conclusions at a glance. These insights and conclusions about priorities and opportunities are the value drivers that propel sales performance and enable managers to focus on their primary job—coaching to develop their people.

About the author 

For over 25 years Gary Marinko has worked in a consultative capacity with Fortune 500 companies solving complex business challenges with technology. More recently Gary has combined his expertise in technology with sales training in the life sciences industry to bring focused value creation to key Proficient Learning customers. In his current role, he leads the interactive business unit at Proficient Learning, which focuses on developing sales enablement software and mobile solutions that help sales teams and managers accelerate performance and efficiency.